After the all clear the family staggered off to a neighbour's house. The mother heavily in shock, the teenage daughter shivering and silent, and the ten year old boy in his pyjamas , kept warm with a chenille curtain wrap and wearing a pair of ladies high heel shoes to protect his feet from the broken glass.
As children we were brought up on this story
The mother of the story was my grandmother. The girl was my mother and the boy was my Uncle Jim.
I learnt yesterday that my Uncle Jim had just died. He was in his eighties.
I have not spoken to my uncle for many years, I always sent Christmas cards, but ill health and family spats and the fact he lived a long way off, meant that a close relationship was not really on the cards.
Having said this....I am truly sorry that he's gone.
His death has heralded the end of an era.
It has highlighted that the last tie to my grandparents has now been severed and a life in that devastated city three quarters of a century ago seems a little more distant and unreal.
Like I said
It's the end of an era.
